The Wedding

I'm sure you've all been sitting on pins and needles waiting to hear about the wedding I catered this past Saturday night. Maybe not~~~ but here goes!

It was a HUGE success! I have never received more compliments at a catering job. The bride and groom stopped me several times to tell me how pleased they were with the food, the staff, etc. The bride and groom were the first people to eat, and the bride enjoyed it so much that she even came back for seconds.... and thirds!

The most heard comment was "This is the best wedding food I've ever had!". I heard this from many of the guests, and from the celebrating couple several times. Even the photographers stopped to tell me that they "do" lots of weddings, and that all of the caterers try to do steak, but end up overcooking it to the point that it becomes tough. They told me that my steak was perfect, and the best that they've ever had at a wedding! Believe it or not, this was my biggest concern. When I did a tasting with the couple last month at the restaurant, the steak was indeed overcooked- it still had a good taste, but was a little too chewy. I assured the couple that it wouldn't be overcooked at the wedding. I said this with my fingers crossed and with a prayer, because I knew that we would have to cook the steak several hours in advance and keep it warm in a cambro, prior to transferring it to chafin racks. Although the steak was to be cooked to rare, it would continue to stay hot and cooking in the cambro and in the chafin rack-- we wanted the steak to be served medium rare, and that's exactly how it turned out. It couldn't have worked out more perfectly. Luckily, there were some leftovers, and we've enjoyed steak and chicken at every meal since the wedding!

I can't thank Michael enough for his help with this event. We never got together and discussed a game plan for the wedding, but we both just fell into our roles and made a perfect team. I had a staff of 7, including Michael and myself. Michael helped to keep everyone on task more than I could have imagined. I didn't hear any of the servers complain; even after 9 hours of arranging furniture, serving and cleaning. Actually one of them did make a comment that they were getting tired--- I reminded them that I had started working 10 hours before any of them arrived at work. I always try to lead by example, and even though I was dead on my feet 19 hours into my workday, I didn't complain and I guess the example I set must have worked-- that and the evil taskmaster, Michael, making sure that no one had a chance to slack off! Thanks again to Michael for standing by me and supporting me with this project... I couldn't have done it without you!

I brought my camera to the wedding, but didn't get any pictures-- my battery died as soon as we got there. One of the servers took some pictures with her phone and hopefully she'll share them with me soon, and I can post some pics of the best wedding reception ever (in my humble opinion!).